Graduated Drivers License Bill Supported in Maryland to Cut Huge Teen Driver Fatality Rate

The fatality rate of teenage drivers in Maryland is three times higher than their percentage of all drivers, underscoring the need to phase in their driving experience gradually, an insurance trade official said today.

To reduce that fatality rate, National Association of Independent Insurers (NAII) local counsel Leo Doyle urged the state Commerce and Government Matters Committee in Annapolis to approve HB 527, a graduated drivers license bill.

HB 527 would require 16- and 17-year-olds to drive only with adult supervision during the first few months, operating under a learner's permit and then a provisional license. With specified exceptions, HB 527 also would prohibit them from driving without adult supervision between 10:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m., the period when most accidents involving their age group occur.

Under the first year of a similar law in Florida, from July 1, 1996, through June 30, 1997, the fatality rate for 16- and 17-year-old drivers dropped by 25 percent during the hours when driving was restricted, Doyle said. And research has shown that night-driving curfews reduce crashes involving that age group by more than 50 percent.

Although only 4.18 percent of all licensed drivers in Maryland are teenagers, they were involved in 12.8 percent of all fatal accidents in 1995, Doyle said. And Maryland's teenage death toll of 61.58 per 100,000 teenage drivers in 1995 was nearly four times the adult fatality rate of 16.21 per 100,000 drivers over age 19, he added.

Nationally, 40 percent of teenage motor vehicle deaths in 1995 occurred between 9:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m., he said. The rate of night-time fatal crashes per 100 million miles traveled by teenage male drivers in 1990 was about four times the rate of 30-to-54-year old male drivers. For females, the teenage rate was more than three times that of the older drivers.

NAII, a national trade association representing more than 560 property/casualty insurance companies nationwide, has supported graduated drivers license legislation in several states in recent years.